Northeast folk tales now on YouTube, popular audio apps

Many folk tales of various ethnic communities in Assam and rest of the Northeast are now available in popular mobile apps such as Spotify, Amazon Music, Apple podcast, Gaana and Google Podcasts.

Many literary works in Assamese and some other ethnic languages in Assam will also be available in digital library of Asam Sahitya Sabha, the century-old literary body in the state. Various literary and cultural activities of the literary organisation, that are organised to protect and promote Assamese language, will also be available on a Youtube channel.

All these digital platforms were inaugurated on Monday – aimed at taking Assamese language and literary works to the tech-savvy new generation.

"The folk tales in Assamese and many other ethnic tribes will be available in these apps in audio format. This has been done to attract our children to our folk tales which we listened to from our grandparents or read while growing up. But nowadays, children are seem to be more busy in mobile games and cartoons and thus they remain deprived of the amazing folk tales prevalent among various ethnic communities.

So we decided to upload many such folk tales in Spotify, Amazon Music, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, which they can easily download and enjoy," president of Asam Sahitya Sabha, Kuladhar Saikia said in Guwahati.

"Studies have shown that children's creativity flourishes through folk tales and so we just hope that the folk tales available in audio format attract our children," Saikia, a Sahitya Akademi awardee and retired IPS officer, said.

"This is an effort to preserve and promote the folk tales using digital platforms, which are already very popular. This is a very significant initiative given the fact that literary bodies are often blamed for not taking the young generation on board in their activities and found lagging behind in the use of technology," said Mrinal Talukdar, a journalist who is part of the folk tales project.

Literary programmes, workshops, storytelling sessions, and many other literary activities undertaken by the Sabha will also be available on the Youtube channel, which was also launched on Sunday.

The Sabha also inaugurated a digital library, in which already more than 500 old books in Assamese have been digitised and uploaded for readers. "Our digitisation project is also something unique as we have involved common people, students and readers to help us collect and digitise the old books, manuscripts, newspapers and journals lying unattended across Assam," Saikia said.

"We are also conducting digital classes to teach Assamese language to our children who can't correctly speak, read or write in their mother tongue as they study in English medium schools. We have also helped the Assamese community living in the US, Australia, Canada and in Mumbai to teach Assamese to their children," Saikia said.

Check out latest DH videos here